Pluchea foetida
Pluchea camphorata
stinking camphorweed
camphor pluchea, camphor weed, plowman's-wort
(often dark purplish) arachnose, glandular.
minutely puberulent and sessile-glandular, usually also closely arachnose (hairs appressed).
sessile;
blades (thick, reticulate-veined) oblong to elliptic, lance-ovate, or ovate, mostly 3–10(–13) × 1–4 cm (bases clasping), margins denticulate (apices rounded to acute), faces minutely sessile-glandular.
petiolate (petioles 10–20 mm);
blades elliptic to oblong-elliptic, 6–15 × 3–7 cm, margins dentate-serrate or entire, faces glandular-puberulent or puberulent and sessile-glandular.
usually cupulate to campanulate, sometimes turbinate-campanulate, 5–10 × 6–9(–12) mm (bases mostly rounded to impressed, sometimes obtuse).
campanulate, 4–6 × 3–4 mm.
creamy white to yellowish or pale pink.
rose purplish.
usually creamy white, sometimes cream, greenish, pinkish, rose-purplish, purplish, yellowish, or pale pink, thinly arachnoid-pubescent and sessile-glandular (the outer ovate to ovate-lanceolate, lengths mostly 0.2–0.6 times inner).
usually cream, sometimes purplish, minutely sessile-glandular (the outer also sparsely puberulent), sometimes glabrate.
in loose to dense, corymbiform arrays.
in paniculiform arrays (of rounded-convex, corymbiform clusters terminating branches from distal nodes, arrays usually resulting from axillary, strongly ascending, bracteate branches, the central axis longest and first to flower and, rarely, the only component of an array).
persistent, bristles distinct.
persistent, bristles distinct.
Pluchea foetida
Pluchea camphorata
Pluchea foetida var. imbricata has not been treated as distinct from typical P. foetida by recent authors (e.g., A. Cronquist 1980; R. K. Godfrey and J. W. Wooten 1981; R. P. Wunderlin et al. 1996). Although plants similar to the type can be found scattered in Florida and Georgia, a populational integrity does not appear to occur, and intermediate forms exist. Nevertheless, field biologists should be aware of the putative distinctions of var. imbricata to make more critical observations regarding its status.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Pluchea camphorata is similar to P. odorata and rarely may hybridize with it. In P. camphorata, the phyllaries of the inner 2–3 series are thin and nearly translucent, lanceolate, and more than twice as long as deltate-ovate phyllaries of the outer series. The inner may be glandular but they are otherwise glabrous, prominently different in vestiture from the outer. The phyllaries of P. odorata are more strongly graduated and the inner are glandular and also clearly puberulent as well.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
1. Distalmost leaves triangular-ovate; heads in tight, rounded clusters at ends of branches; involucres turbinate-campanulate, 9–10 mm; phyllaries pink- ish to rose-purplish | var. imbricata |
1. Distalmost leaves mostly oblong-elliptic; heads in paniculiform arrays of usually flat-topped cymiform clusters; involucres broadly campanulate, 5–8 mm; phyllaries cream to greenish | var. foetida |
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